


when the smoke cleared, i awoke here

by sazzafraz



Category: The Black Tapes Podcast
Genre: Alternate Universe - Sentinels & Guides, F/M, Murder Mystery, Mystery, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-05
Updated: 2017-08-16
Packaged: 2018-12-11 09:49:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11711901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sazzafraz/pseuds/sazzafraz
Summary: Alex’s first impression, even before noting just how handsome he is, is that his soul shines with availability it’s just his demeanor, expression, personality and general milieu that says ‘don’t even try it’. (Or, immovable self made object Sentinel Richard Strand meets unstoppable dubiously ethical force and Guide Alex Reagan. They solve mysteries. Maybe.)





	1. Side A

**Author's Note:**

> I have jumped head first into this hell hole.

Alex is five when her spirit settles into a fox. She’s outside, in the Canadian winter, scarf wrapped three times around her face. Her hands are in the air feeling the cold take her fingers all the way down to the bone. She pulls them down quickly and sticks them under her scarf, presses them to her mouth. Cold skin tastes salty, a little like the soap her mother made her wash her hands with. She puts her hands up again.

A fox dashes across the snow. Large, long, lean and beautiful. Years and year later Alex will learn that her colouring is called _Fire and Ice._ A softly brindled platinum and gold, bold with highlights of brown and a dash of red across her tail, like she dipped it in paint and ran away before she could get caught. The fox sticks her tongue out, rises on her paws and falls in the snow, wriggling.

On hands and knees Alex approaches. She’s within a foot of the pretty fox when it snaps onto its feet and growls. Long teeth and pink gums.

Alex tries to touch it anyway.

The fox stops growling abruptly. Curiously still when Alex’s cold fingers touch her nose. The fox sneezes. Alex sneezes. She crawls up until she can put curious fingers through the foxes fur. The fox relaxes under touch.

“Firinne,” the fox says. Her voice is too deep and strong by half, she sounds amused and flirtatious with her teeth tucked away. “Don’t call me anything else.”

Alex never does.

\--

The protocol around five sense Sentinels crossing state lines is an archaic left over from the Civil War. As a Guide who scores a nice ethically comfortable three on a scale to six, Alex worries around travelling revolve around checking in with the locals and not accidentally having a meet cute in the centre foyer. When she and Nic decide to interview Richard Strand it all gets very complicated very quickly. Sentinels can’t travel across state lines without permission, Seattle isn't interested in hosting him and Alex can’t go to Chicago unless he comes here first. Two years ago Seattle lost a high level Guide to Chicago PD when he moved down there and bonded near spontaneously. There aren’t enough high level Guides and Sentinels to go around anymore and every centre is zealous about theirs.

None of these are hard and fast rules, but the Mathison Centres for Guides and Sentinels likes to remind people of its power arbitrarily. Its Big Brother like qualities are necessary: every centre provides medical, legal and psychological counsel for registered Guides and Sentinels. Every state has at least one. Every centre is run like a miniature island capable of operating even if the country falls into a dystopian teen novel next week. And if they don’t want someone then by god they will not have someone.

Luckily, Alex Reagan is charming, tenacious and surprising well connected at her local centre. If _she_ wants Richard Strand to visit Seattle so they’ll let her go to Chicago then by god someone is letting Doctor Strand fly to Seattle. They put him on a plane and fly him out to her. This is possibly not the best first introduction but there’s not much to be done now.   

In terms of her work what Alex knows about her subject is limited to what she shares on the show. A lot of people hate him, his voice is _amazing_ for radio and he’s very smart. What Guide Alex, who operates by a different set of ethics, knows is that Richard Strand is one of six Sentinels in Chicago above a four. He has five enhanced senses, is unbonded and is about as bad as she is at social functions. Alex is terrible at Sentinel-Guide parties because she’s fundamentally uninterested in the romance of her abilities. She likes her ability to gut check, her immunity to social pressure and the reckless backbone actually _knowing_ how she affects people gives her. Sentinels are genuinely fascinating to her. Just not, generally, as relationship material.

Doctor Strand, however, is twenty years older than her easily and stubborn proof that quality of life _doesn’t_ go down for Sentinels after thirty without bonding. He is also very, _very_ vocal about this. Alex knows that he doesn’t like parties and no one has fun when he goes.   

Alex’s first impression, even before noting just how handsome he is, is that his soul shines with availability it’s just his demeanor, expression, personality and general milieu that says ‘don’t even try it’.

Her second thought is that she should figure out where his spirit companion is before someone does something rude like try and shoo it outside. It’s happened a time or two with particularly uncomfortable Sentinels. She lets the lowest level of power, the one reserved for making sure she doesn’t fall into obvious emotional potholes with her interviewees, scan the room. There are a few pings on the interns, Nic and then-

Alex is very practiced at picking and choosing expressions. She is pretty much what you see is what you get but Guide’s don’t really get the luxury of a sheer gut reaction to things. She has to keep a careful barrier between her power and the outside world. It’s this often flexed muscle that stops her from gasping -or laughing- when she sees it.

It’s a raven. A one eyed raven.

Alex has fought several people’s better judgement to get here. She’s not going to mess it up by laughing at him. Even if this is why her local centre just sighed and pinched their collective noses at her when she requested permission to meet him for professional purposes. One of them even tentatively asked if it was _bonding_ she wanted. Alex smiled at that one. If there was a less likely person on her side of the country to look for _that_ she hadn’t met them yet.

Still, Sentinels. Have to be careful with Sentinels. “Hi, Doctor Strand?”

His attention swivels to her, his eyes narrow and he finally registers her as what she is. He stands just a little straighter on an already tall frame and offers her slightly more diligence than his reputation -and what little experience she has, would suggest. “Yes.” Wow, okay, he actually _sounds_ like that. “You must be Alex Reagan? Of the eleven phone calls?”

She smiles. “I am. Follow me.” She leads him to a small, soundproof room where they sit, uncomfortable, just in case one of them swan dives off the edge of reason and they wind up bound together forever. Nic gives her a sheepish grin when he sticks his head and tells them the half hour is up.

Both of them stand and straighten out their clothes. Somehow Doctor Strand finds lint on his.

After a long moment he holds out his hand. He doesn’t look at her, Alex breathes in, exhales and puts her much smaller hand in his. Nothing. Just warm, dry skin. If Alex has been to a round dozen of these, Doctor Strand must have been to a baker’s dozen, baker’s dozen of them. It only lasts five minutes but it means that when she gets on a plane next week no one is going to cause a fuss. There is no chance of them bonding. Alex drives him back to the airport because unlike the rental her car is Sentinel grade. He’s a polite, gracious companion until they arrive at the airport. She stops the car and waits for him to exit.

After a few moments of silence, he says, “The human mind isn’t equipped to deal with the...strain of enhanced senses. It’s a thoroughly researched area of psychology. We -your kind and mine- externalise a part of ourselves to act as a filter. Raven’s are very smart birds.”

Should she say that she agrees? “Okay.” Alex agrees. She, too, has heard this speech.

He frowns. “Good.”

He leaves and the terminally curious part of her is a little bereft. He’s _interesting._ A week later their first interview goes well until it doesn’t. She slips up. He kicks her out. She tries ineffectually to apologise. When she gets home she checks her inbox to find the ever present message from the centre asking for an update on her personal status, a message from the Chicago centre asking if there’s anyway she might share her file and a message from her old mentor at the main centre in Toronto asking her what the hell she’s doing shaking the twisting, spiralling tree that is Richard Strand. Doesn’t she know there are better, easier ways to get herself put on a no fly list across most of middle America? Alex sighs, pats her spirit companion, and tries to find an angle to approach her story at.   

And that’s the first day with Doctor Strand.

 

 


	2. Side B

About fourteen years ago, just past the point at which people stopped bringing up Coralee, Richard retreated to Chicago and point blank refused to interact with any Guide or Sentinel outside of his work. He was past thirty, he didn’t want a Guide. He  _ wanted  _ people to accept that his quality of life was up to him not dictated by some bullshit ‘mystical force’ that was unreliable in controlled conditions. Chicago is respectful of this owing to his father’s reputation in more  _ old school  _ circles and the daft but eerily persistent idea that he will one day wake up and bang down the doors to his local centre begging for a Guide. Even at some years past fifty this has not abated. 

Then eleven - _ eleven-  _ messages end up on his phone. Ruby is listless at the interruption and since he relies heavily on her competence he finds himself looking up Alexandra Reagan, journalist. He listens a few times through her popular pieces and then a few more that satisfy him personally. She has a Guide’s well balanced intonation; friendly and calm. She clearly likes and enjoys her work with a healthy amount of skepticism about some of the wilder aspects. He listens to her talk about something called  _ Tanis  _ with professional interest and knows he would of walked out two minutes in.      

As a Guide Alex Reagan is middle of the road and by all accounts very happy with it. She has no interest in bonding being focused on her work to the exclusion of all else. She’s well liked, charming and leaves egregious amounts of voicemails to  _ other  _ people too. Determined, resourceful, polite. These were the words that convinced him to get on the plane.

(That and the fact that Ms Reagan made her inability to reach him several other peoples problem. If he  _ doesn’t  _ get on the plane he will be forced to take on a  _ mentorship  _ to young Sentinels. He loves teaching, he does not love the delusions of grandeur other Sentinels are given to.)

He knows that the centre must be hoping for same Hail Mary spontaneous bond. Something that will prove that the point Richard has been making by waking up and going about his day is false. Sentinels need Guides. That Richard has proven that  _ wrong  _ since he was sixteen must be galling for them. He could feel more sorry about it, possibly.

He will admit to more than a passing glance of nervousness. Alex Reagan’s voice has stuck with him longer than he expected it to. Not a fixation, certainly nothing as nauseatingly unscientific as ‘partial bonding’, but a certain...awareness. He finds his mind running over the pronunciation of her words, the falls and pulls of consonants. A very, very long time he found himself feeling a similar pull. Look how  _ that  _ ended. 

When Nic Silver introduces himself he catches the first idea of what Alex Reagan is like. Nic is handsome in that new way that has only become popular in the technology age and smells deeply of the woods. So much so Richard can taste it under his tongue. Floating around him is the thin miasma he’s long since associated with Guides -responses, connections the mind makes to give him information. This Guide drinks tea, wears a herbal perfume and washes her hair with raspberry scented shampoo. She’s also known the man in front of him long enough to leave her mark on him. 

Something pings on him and his attention turns. Over there, a Guide- 

Alex Reagan smiles at him, no, something over his shoulder, but since he knows what she’s looking at he dismisses it. She pulls to her full, unimpressive height and strikes forward. “Hi, Doctor Strand?”

“Yes. You must be Alex Reagan.” He can feel the wash of her voice over him. No spontaneous bond but the pull is just the same. “Of the eleven phone calls.”   

All in all, he thinks this might go rather well. 

\--

Three months into a partnership with the still interesting, enigmatic Doctor Strand Alex is thinking quite clearly about murdering him. If he says apophenia-

“It’s a mass delusion,” he says clear and confident into her recorder. This is the five minute audio she needs to bridge their journey from Seattle proper to this small creepy town she’s never heard of. Since it is  _ not  _ apophenia she  _ isn’t  _ going to leave him to walk along the side of the highway, but that’s more to do with her polite upbringing. Strand is comfortable talking about anything. This is a trait worth it’s weight in gold to a good journalist. It isn’t always great for her nerves. 

“A mass delusion involving missing people? I mean. Why not go for vampires?”

Strand smiles. “Lack of imagination.”

Alex bites her lip. After a moment Strand prods her. “What?”

“You know what Twilight is?”

He laughs, and this is the point at which Alex mentally cuts the tape. It’s not that she’s invested in people thinking well of Strand -that would be thankless and pointless- but between the many listeners who understandably want to hear that voice in other more, er, _ ethically circumspect _ situations, are those who find him inhuman and cold. As a lifelong studier of interesting things Alex is slightly angered on his behalf. Interesting things don’t need to be _ pleasant  _ even if it would make her job easier. She tries her best to show him as human, feeling in small moments. Ethically justifiable ones. After all the audience doesn’t get to hear what happens when the tape is off. 

With that thought- 

“Okay,” she hits pause without looking, “we’re off the air. How’s things?”

“In the car? Fine. In America? We’re on the verge of a political decision that could end the American journey-”

“Shh,” she laughs. “No politics on highways. If we get distracted I could cross the line and hit a moose.”

Strand considers this with a blank seriousness that tells her he missed her joke. It’s always a coin toss with him. “Maybe I should drive.”

Ah, Sentinels. “I know how my GPS works.”

He looks at her, the GPS, the road as if to say  _ how hard could it be?  _ Asshole. 

Alex cheerily waves out the window. “But then you’d miss the wild.”

He looks out the window. “It would be a shame to miss that.” His head flexes, tenses in a motion Alex is familiar with even if she hasn’t seen it much. “There are a lot of birds. A few hundred metres out.”

“Cool.”

Strand resettles himself. “This isn’t one of my cases.”

“It was sent to Nic, who gave it to an intern, who gave it to me. I  _ gave  _ you the opportunity to say no.” Alex replies. “You’ve read the notes?”

He grunts. “A small town with a pseudo-pagan festival in which young lovers journey into the woods and are ‘never seen or heard from again,’” he uses actual quotation marks, bless, “until they get cold. Or hungry. Or run out of contraceptives. This is to honour the ‘protector and the provider’. Who are  _ not  _ a thin allegory but genuine supernatural forces protecting the town. From demons.”

“Yep.” Alex rolls her p out a long while. This is one of the funnest parts of their partnership. “Once a month they go out to, er, commune with nature. Except this month, and last month, a few of the couples reported seeing strange symbols. A few people even reported that some people came back  _ changed. _ ”  

Strand’s mouth pulls back. “There isn’t a recorder Alex. No need to emphasise what doesn’t require it.”

Why let a good thing pass you by? “Nic made reservations at a hotel. They have a lot of them for some reason.” 

Strand grumbles that sounds suspiciously like  _ sex in the woods is not a worthwhile endeavour,  _ but Alex lacks Sentinel hearing. Besides there are better things to do. Like find out if Strand has any egregious libertarian values. 

\-- 

The hotel is...weird. Not that she’s complaining. Okay, she’s complaining, but the walls full of dead animal heads warrant it.

“How is this not bothering you?” she asks Strand as they stand at the reception. 

“You haven’t been to the Sentinel Hall in the Sandburg Centre I gather,” he murmurs back.

“No.” 

“They share an interior designer.”

Yikes. She dings the bell again causing Stand to flinch. The room is filled with big uncomfortable looking furniture, big green walls and too many corners. She feels her vision...dim for lack of a better word and another image lay over the first. Men in robes, bones strewn over the floor and a woman in a white dress lying prone on the floor. A man enters, covered in feathers, covered in mud. He prowls over the lone woman, touches, squeezes, tastes. It’s frightening. And intimate. There’s a hot, blistering sensation across her skin like something has pricked and kissed it’s way across her legs and up her back. An invisible hand presses against her neck, holds her still for something, like a kiss or-

“Miss Reagan?” Strand’s voice interrupts. She blinks away the feeling, letting Strand’s sudden formality drag her back. Strand frowns at her. One of the impressive ones that manages to convey a wealth of skepticism about whatever it is you’re doing. In the mirror Alex catches her flushed expression. It doesn’t inspire confidence. Strand clears his throat. “I can finish checking in.”  

Right. Alex pulls a smile and walks towards a far hallway that must lead to the rooms. She’s standing, uncomfortable, one hand wrapped around her side when an old woman rushes up to her. She’s at least seventy.    

“You’re finally here.” The woman cups Alex’s cheeks. “It’s so good to see you again.”

“Er,” Alex says, “sure.”

The old woman sighs happily. Her breath smells like dead herbs and cigarette smoke. “Oh I knew the time would come again.” 

The old woman pats her once on the cheek and then peels away down the hall. 

Alex rubs her cheeks. Strand walks the long way around, eyebrow raised. “A friend?”

For some reason that Alex lacks the relevant personal information to understand, Strand thinks she’s overly friendly. Alex is polite, more than that she is a nice Canadian girl who grew up in a small town where everyone knew everyone else's business right down to the damn bears that liked to hang out on Maddie Svensson's porch. What she is, is rigorous in her upfront defence against future rumors. Nice makes that easy. 

Maybe she should tell him that.

With that warm thought tucked away she lets herself relax, return to the pleasant warm state that she’s spent years cultivating as both a Guide and a reporter. Strand is right: she is actually straight up nice, but she’s also self aware enough to know that a friendly demeanor always helps. 

“Nope.” Alex smiles and makes a mocking gesture of offering her arm. Strand leans back, wry smile firmly in place. He’s carefully, politely rebuffed any of the small gestures she’s trained to offer Sentinels in unfamiliar surroundings. Small things: a hand up, her scarf, anything that will stop him from losing control of senses. She doesn’t mind that, but he’s a Sentinel in her space, during which they encounter a lot of unsettling things. She would be unkind not to offer. “Which way to our rooms?”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I will happily admit that my favourite thing about this couple, besides their matching lack of ethical fortitude, is that they are never on the same page except in dire situations. They're literally having two different conversations and not noticing because the words more or less match up.
> 
> Also I finally got to the end of the series/started Tanis and I would like to invite both Nic and Alex's ethics professors to fight me.

**Author's Note:**

> Alex's reaction to hearing Strand for the first time is basically mine: I was a lot less interested until you started talking. 
> 
> I'm not entirely sold on where this fic is going. It will be a partial retreading of water but I feel an urge to go back to my more fairy tale-esque roots coming on. There is a strong likelihood of romance later on, just so you know. I also have no idea what Strand's raven is called. I can't think of anything suitably pretentious.


End file.
